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Keyword Quality Score – How to Increase the Quality Score of Your Keywords

Keyword Quality Score has a major impact on both the success and the costs of your pay-per-click (PPC) marketing campaigns. High keyword Quality Scores mean you end up paying less for more ad exposure and higher conversion rates.

The following two best practices will raise your Quality Score at every level, from your entire AdWords campaign down to a single keyword:

Let's take a closer look at how you can use WordStream's PPC management tools to start improving your Quality Scores today.

Grade Your Keyword Quality Score Performance Free

WordStream's fast, free, secure AdWords Performance Grader is the easiest way to find out how your Quality Scores are doing, plus get tips on how you can raise your scores. You'll get an instant report including an overall grade for your AdWords account, plus insight into your performance along key metrics including Quality Score, keyword optimization, and click-through rate.

What Does Keyword Quality Score Mean to You?

Keyword Quality Score is a dynamic figure, meaning AdWords calculates a Quality Score on the fly for each of your keywords whenever they match a user's search query. Your keyword's Quality Score may vary based on location, search query and search network. In other words, if your keyword performs better on certain searches than others, in certain areas than others, or on certain search network sites than others, its Quality Score will be higher under those circumstances. That's a lot to keep track of! But one thing is always the same: The higher your keyword Quality Score, the better your ad positioning, and the lower your costs.

Basically, Google uses Quality Score to ensure that users only see the sponsored links that are most relevant to their queries. This system is good for you too, because more relevant ads get more clicks and bring you more business.

Creating small, focused keyword groups at the outset and then building self-reinforcing campaigns gives you strong historical account performance and compounding pricing and positioning benefits. But how exactly are you supposed to organize the thousands of keywords (or more) that you need to manage for successful search engine marketing? You can't possibly look at every single keyword individually, hand-sort it into an appropriate group and then write the perfect ad for it. There's not enough time in the day.

So how do you raise your keyword Quality Score so you can start increasing your visibility at lower costs?

How WordStream Can Help You Increase Keyword Quality Score

The WordStream keyword management system helps you create and maintain high Quality Score keywords and Ad Groups with two key functionalities:

Creating strong keyword groups is the single most important step you can take toward improving your Quality Scores and overall PPC performance. WordStream's sophisticated AdWords keyword grouping tools make it easy to segment your proprietary keyword database into manageable, closely knit groups on an iterative basis. These groups pass value down to each individual keyword, increasing the chances that your ad will show (at a low cost) for a relevant search.

WordStream Makes Writing Highly Relevant Ad Text Easy

Another way that WordStream increases keyword Quality Score is by helping you write more relevant ad text, thereby increasing the click-through rate of your keywords and their corresponding ads.

Because WordStream is integrated with AdWords, it's incredibly easy to convert the keyword groups you've created into AdWords Ad Groups: Just right-click the keyword group and select “Create Google AdWords Group for Selected Group” from the pop-up menu. Then select the AdWords campaign you want the Ad Group to belong to. As soon as you've set the Ad Group's properties, you're ready to start crafting high-CTR text ads.

After creating an Ad Group, click the Text Ads tab and then "Add New Text Ad". WordStream will automatically suggest text for your ad's headline, description lines, display URL and destination URL, based on the Ad Group's keywords and properties – a big timesaver.

You can (and should) adjust the ad text to your liking; the preview box on the right shows what your ad will look like when it appears in Google SERPs. Here are some factors to keep in mind when writing ads to ensure high click-through rate and Quality Score. Your ad text should be:

Relevant to your product.

Relevant to the keyword (and therefore the searcher's intent).

Relevant to your landing page.

Be sure to include the keyword and variations of it in the headline and description lines, and the display URL if possible. The ad should draw the user in and tell them what they'll gain by clicking. The destination URL should take the searcher to a landing page that corresponds to their search query and intent (not something too broad or too narrow).

Remember, your ads will be useless if they don't actually help people find what they're looking for! Plus, when more people click on your ads, your AdWords Quality Score goes up and your keywords, Ad Groups and account all gain value – leading to more and more low-cost impressions as your campaign goes on. That's more opportunities for conversions, all for lower costs per ad!

Try WordStream and Start Improving Your Keyword Quality Score Today

Don't waste another day paying more than you have to for less than desirable ad positioning. Increase the effectiveness of your PPC campaigns, and save time and money while raising your keyword Quality Score.